Just joined, severely matted hair due to living in a mould infested house

[KittyKmew]

Thank you to everyone who has replied, it's all been really helpful for me. Yes my doctor knows the issues, good news is is my partner and I are recovering well, eating a clean diet, we disposed of everything we owned from the mouldy house and started completely afresh to stay free of spores / contaminated stuff etc.

[shelomit]

I don't have good suggestions, but am happy that you guys are out of that unhealthy house and hope that everything works out okay <3

[Garnetgem]

Hello and welcome to LHC and i too am recovering from mould sickness,we lived in a mould infested house for 16 years unaware of its dangers like your landlord ours is hopeless,and yes we have stayed but cleaned it up best we can using mould paint all sorts of stuff(unable to move at moment).only thing that's helped are dehumidifiers as my mum was wheezing due to the mould,

recovery is a slow process with mould sickness and hair suffers my mum lost handfulls so did i too and at that time i had knee length so i understand how you feel,have you tried activated charcoal? as it helps you get it out of your system sooner we are about to try it,as for matted hair i use olive oil as i did get terrible tangles after a big shedding it really helped,

glad your out of there and i hope you have a good recovery..

[KittyKmew]

I don't have good suggestions, but am happy that you guys are out of that unhealthy house and hope that everything works out okay <3

Thank you, we are happy to be out of there too

[KittyKmew]

Hello and welcome to LHC and i too am recovering from mould sickness,we lived in a mould infested house for 16 years unaware of its dangers like your landlord ours is hopeless,and yes we have stayed but cleaned it up best we can using mould paint all sorts of stuff(unable to move at moment).only thing that's helped are dehumidifiers as my mum was wheezing due to the mould,

recovery is a slow process with mould sickness and hair suffers my mum lost handfulls so did i too and at that time i had knee length so i understand how you feel,have you tried activated charcoal? as it helps you get it out of your system sooner we are about to try it,as for matted hair i use olive oil as i did get terrible tangles after a big shedding it really helped,

glad your out of there and i hope you have a good recovery..

Thank you, I'm really sorry to hear you are going through the same thing, it's awful what it does to your health

I haven't tried olive oil yet, but it's what I'm going to try next, I'm glad it worked on your hair I have heard of the activated charcoal but not tried it myself, from what I read it's really good and you can take it orally or put bags of them around the house - apparently this will contain all the invisible mould spores that will be floating around in the air in the home.
I hope it works well for you and your mum and if your landlord won't take action you could take it further, there's a really good charity called Shelter who will help guide you in the right direction, you can phone them or speak to them online - I think you can report it the council / enviromental health etc (sorry I'm not 100% sure which), but they will order your landlord to carry out the repairs and if he doesn't they can do the work themselves and bill the landlord for it.

[Sabrina Fair]

UK resident here. I’m so sorry you’re going through this.

Your best bet may be treating your involuntary mats like dreadlocks. Most of the dreadlock-specific products seem to be American, but the recommendations suggest:

- masses and masses of extremely slippery conditioner on dry hair (so whatever is cheap and heavy on the cones, as you’re going to need a lot)
- oils (also on dry hair)
- industrial volumes of detangler (I have seen Mane ‘n Tail detangler recommended, and it's affordable and available at some Superdrugs and at amazon.co.uk - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Mane-Tail-M...SY872MQNMWK4XZ
- keeping the ph of your hair under 5.5 so raised cuticles don’t contribute to the tangling. They suggest achieving this by doing a deep soak with vinegar. Since you said that you need to avoid vinegar, citric acid might have the same effect without feeding the mould? Then let your hair dry completely before slathering with your conditioner/detangler.
- Some of the recommendations say to wash your hair with a clarifying shampoo first, but this advice is geared towards actual dreadlocks. Presumably you don’t have months or years of wax and product buildup to remove before you can detangle, so working with conditioner and/or detangler on dry hair may prevent felting.
- Work on one very small section at a time, and don’t plan to get through the lot all in one go (but doubtless you’ve figured that one out!)
- If you google “how to remove dreadlocks without cutting” you will find a number of sites that will walk you through the steps of carefully detangling these kinds of mats with the pointy end of a rat-tail comb or similar.
- If you live in an area with hair salons for natural hair, you might ask if they have someone who has a lot of experience removing dreadlocks. You never know, they may be able to assist or advise!

The mould smell sounds horrific. Perhaps try a combination of clarifying shampoo and a tea tree oil-based oil treatment? I hope things improve soon!

[KittyKmew]

UK resident here. I’m so sorry you’re going through this.

Your best bet may be treating your involuntary mats like dreadlocks. Most of the dreadlock-specific products seem to be American, but the recommendations suggest:

- masses and masses of extremely slippery conditioner on dry hair (so whatever is cheap and heavy on the cones, as you’re going to need a lot)
- oils (also on dry hair)
- industrial volumes of detangler (I have seen Mane ‘n Tail detangler recommended, and it's affordable and available at some Superdrugs and at amazon.co.uk - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Mane-Tail-M...SY872MQNMWK4XZ
- keeping the ph of your hair under 5.5 so raised cuticles don’t contribute to the tangling. They suggest achieving this by doing a deep soak with vinegar. Since you said that you need to avoid vinegar, citric acid might have the same effect without feeding the mould? Then let your hair dry completely before slathering with your conditioner/detangler.
- Some of the recommendations say to wash your hair with a clarifying shampoo first, but this advice is geared towards actual dreadlocks. Presumably you don’t have months or years of wax and product buildup to remove before you can detangle, so working with conditioner and/or detangler on dry hair may prevent felting.
- Work on one very small section at a time, and don’t plan to get through the lot all in one go (but doubtless you’ve figured that one out!)
- If you google “how to remove dreadlocks without cutting” you will find a number of sites that will walk you through the steps of carefully detangling these kinds of mats with the pointy end of a rat-tail comb or similar.
- If you live in an area with hair salons for natural hair, you might ask if they have someone who has a lot of experience removing dreadlocks. You never know, they may be able to assist or advise!

The mould smell sounds horrific. Perhaps try a combination of clarifying shampoo and a tea tree oil-based oil treatment? I hope things improve soon!

Thank you for the detailed info, that's really helpful

Yes the mould smell is horrific - we had mould in every single room of the house - some types were the classic musty smell which can be easily escaped, but unfortunately there was an even worse one, it smells very sweet, almost like perfume at first. That particular type of mould clings to absolutely everything and once it's on fabrics / clothing etc there's no getting rid of it. It's very strong and stubborn and travels far. Fortunately it can be washed out of hair though - my partner also lost his hair but he just shaved it off and it suits him

There's no way I'm shaving my head though lol! Going to try and save it with the olive oil and other things first, and think if none of that works I don't mind cutting it, thanks to everyone's comments here it's given me confidence to move forward with it

[Sabrina Fair]

One more useful resource: I ran across this today and thought of you!
https://www.longlocks.com/removing-knots-from-hair.htm
Let us know how you're getting on...

[StellaStellitsa]

A terrible thing to happen. I too slept for years in a room with high humidity and mold. I remember I was always waking up with terrible headaches every morning. I don't know if it was from the humidity or the mold. I wish you a good recovery and for your organism to clean from the mold. Sadly I don't have anything new to recomend to you that has not been said already (not that I thought all the options recomended). But what I can offer you is my moral support. Three years ago in December my hair got matted too. I tried to detangle it as much as possible, but I was using a brush and my hair was also still curly back then, so, it was incredibly painful and apparently ineffective for the matted part. As the days passed the matted part was growing. Things became even worse when I washed my hair. I put shampoo on the matted hair and shampooed all my length in it (I didn't know any better, yet, and after that I put conditioner on my roots). This led to most of my hair becoming part of the matted hairs. Which led me to cutting my hair short, from hip length to chin at the longest part in the front, pretty close to Christmas. The support I want to offer to you is the fact that even if you have to cut your hair short, it will grow back again, and it can reach again it's previous length and even grow longer. It may make you feel bad and sad at the beginning but time will pass. I, for example, am again close to hip length, and looking back now time seems to have passed quickly. And lucky you to have a long wig which you can use if you feel it is necessary. I wonder though, when you wash your hair do you shampoo the matted part? It could possibly make the hair coarse and raise its cutticle which would make it even harder to detangle.

Edited to add the words "still" and "back then" to a part of my comment.

[lillabug]

I don't have any suggestions but your landlord sucks I'm sorry that happened to you